Abstract. “Context ” is notoriously vague, and its uses multifarious. Researchers in “contextual vocabulary acquisition” differ over the kinds of context involved in vocabulary learning, and the methods and benefits thereof. This paper presents a computational theory of contextual vocabulary acquisition, identifies the relevant notion of context, exhibits the assumptions behind some classic objections, and defends our theory against these objections. 1 A Computational Theory of Contextual Vocabulary Acquisition Contextual vocabulary acquisition (CVA) is the active, deliberate acquisition of a meaning for a word in a text by reasoning from context, where “context ” includes: (1) the reader’s “internalization ” of the surrounding text, i.e., the reader’s “mental model ” of the word’s “textual context ” (or “co-text”: Brown & Yule 1983: 46–50, citing Halliday; Haastrup 1991) integrated with (2) the reader’s prior knowledge (including (a) the reader’s knowledge of language and (b) meaning hypotheses developed by the reader from prior encounters with the word), but it excludes (3) external sources of help such as dictionaries or people. CVA is a process that can be used by a reader to figure out a meaning for an unfamiliar word as it occurs in a passage being read. It is what you do when you come across such a word in your reading, realize that you don’t know what it means, and decide that you need to know what it means in order to understand the passage, but there is no one around to ask, and it is not in the dictionary (or you are too lazy to look it up). In such a case, you can try to figure out

This essay continues my investigation of `syntactic semantics': the theory that, pace Searle's Chinese-Room Argument, syntax does suffice for semantics (in particular, for the semantics needed for a computational cognitive theory of natural-language understanding). Here, I argue that syntactic semantics (which is internal and first-person) is what has been called a conceptual-role semantics: The meaning of any expression is the role that it plays in the complete system of expressions. Such a `narrow', conceptual-role semantics is the appropriate sort of semantics to account (from an `internal', or first-person perspective) for how a cognitive agent understands language. Some have argued for the primacy of external, or `wide', semantics, while others have argued for a two-factor analysis. But, although two factors can be specified---one internal and first-person, the other only specifiable in an external, third-person way---only the internal, first-person one is needed for understanding how someone understands. A truth-conditional semantics can still be provided, but only from a third-person perspective.

I advocate a theory of "syntactic semantics" as a way of understanding how computers can think (and how the Chinese-Roam-Argument objection to the Turing Test can be overcome): (1) Semantics, considered as the study of relations between symbols and meanings, can be turned into syntax- a study of relations among symbols (including meanings)- and hence syntax (i.e., symbol manipulation) can suffice for the semantical enterprise (contra Searle). (2) Semantics, considered as the process of understanding one domain (by modeling it) in terms of another, can be viewed recursively: The base case of semantic understanding- understanding a domain in terms of itself- is "syntactic understanding." (3) An internal (or "narrow"), first-person point of view makes an external (or "wide"), third-person point of view otiose for purposes of understanding cognition.

What is the computational notion of "implementation"? It is not individuation, instantiation, reduction, or supervenience. It is, I suggest, semantic interpretation. This document is Technical Report 97-15 (Buffalo: SUNY Buffalo Department of Computer Science) and Technical Report 97-5 (Buffalo: SUNY Buffalo Center for Cognitive Science). 1 INTRODUCTION Consider the relationships among algorithms, computer programs, and the computers that execute them. An algorithm is (roughly) a procedure for computing a function (for more details, see Soare 1996; Rapaport, forthcoming). A program is a more specific and detailed textual expression of an algorithm, expressed in a programming language. Often, it is said that the program "implements" the algorithm. A computer process is an algorithm being executed (see Rapaport 1988, 1995; Smith 1997). It is a physical device (a computer) behaving in a certain way ; the way is described (or specified) by the program, and the physical device running the ...

This essay explores the implications of the thesis that implementation is semantic interpretation. Implementation is (at least) a ternary relation: I is an implementation of an ‘Abstraction ’ A in some medium M. Examples are presented from the arts, from language, from computer science and from cognitive science, where both brains and computers can be understood as implementing a ‘mind Abstraction’. Implementations have side effects due to the implementing medium; these can account for several puzzles surrounding qualia. Finally, an argument for benign panpsychism is developed.